Embarrassingly greedy DH

[Ludicruss]

Today, we had a socially distanced gathering for a handful of people in our garden. It was great, but I'd forgotten about the way DH behaves around food when we're entertaining in our own home.
I was serving the food myself to prevent the risk of any covid contamination, wearing gloves. DH goes to find something to do inside whilst I serve the food for everyone and myself. He reappears when everyone starts eating and serves his own plate. What he then does is finish EVERYTHING off, leaving no possibility for me to return to serve up seconds for anyone. I was mortified. His plate was over flowing and more than doubled everyone elses plate.
I could see him standing at the side of the garden eating away his mountain of food out of the corner of my eye, DM got up to see what was left when she had finished, clearly intending to have some more. But all of it had gone.
I had tipped 3 packets of crisps into one bowl and nobody had asked for any during the first time I was serving, when I looked into the bowl after DHs visit, there were around 8 crisps left in the bottom of it. He had demolished almost all of them.
There was a tiny piece of chicken left and a pitta bread which DM ate as she clearly hadn't finished eating ( she had only wanted a small amount on her plate originally). I was also still hungry.
I had made most of the food and I'm pissed off that my effort was wasted on him stuffing himself with it all.
I was utterly embarrassed.
I made a joke about him eating all the crisps and DH went extremely red in the face. He will no doubt call me out on it later on for embarrassing HIM!
He is very over-weight and embarrassed about it, but nobody is allowed to mention it or his eating habits. And yet he stuffed himself with all the food for the guests.

How do I broach this? I love entertaining, I have really missed it, but he spoilt it for me today.

He doesn't do this when he visits other peoples houses,just at ours.

If there is ever shared food on the table at regular meal times,he always seems to wait until we all have a bit on our plates and then eats everything that's left. Sometimes I find myself filling my own plate with too much before he dives in and eats it all. I rarely serve food this way in th3 evenings because of his greediness. But it can't be helped when entertaining.

What do I say to him?
It's ridiculous.

3 bag of crisps for how many people? The little bags? I think you didnt serve enough food as your dh having one plate twice the size of other people shouldnt clear out all the food.

Factual and measured? Really?

What he then does is finish EVERYTHING off

His plate was over flowing and more than doubled everyone elses plate.

eating away his mountain of food

all of it had gone.

had demolished almost all of them.

he stuffed himself with all the food for the guests.

That's just from the first post about 2.5 chicken breasts, 3 pittas and 2/3 bags of crisps.

people's

'If I was your guest I would have noticed your attitude to your husband more than (one plate) of food being eaten by one of the hosts.'

I would think that you hadn't made enough food and your husband was the scapegoat. Yes he shouldn't have piled his plate high but also that shouldn't have meant no food left

@Raindancer411 well that's about what the guests ate, whom OP insists they barely eat but somehow they were still hungry and it's all the DH's fault.

6 chicken breasts ,5.5 pittas and buckets of salad between 4 grownups and a child.

I think it’s really quite scary how many posters there are on here who are happy to normalise domestic abuse simply because the perpetrator is a woman.

So what? It is still true. He clearly has issues with food that need to be addressed from what the OP has posted

Right, and you think it’s her job and embarrassing him in front of family and being horrible about him is the way to sort his issues with food?

Honest to god, I’d rather have food issues than be abusive to my partner.

I also for the life of me can’t see a grown man eating two chicken breast and three small pittas for bread as having issues with food. Sure he’s overweight, but given her predilection to over exaggeration I’d not be surprised if he was a healthy weight.

And for my money someone who counts three small bags of crisps for six people as a large amount, portions pitta bread by the half and counts the crisps has way, way bigger issues with food than the person who had an extra chicken breast when they thought everyone had been served.

My husband is super fit and runs miles (As well as gym when it was open) he would eat more than 1.5 bits of chicken.
At first when i read i thought god how embarrassing (imagining mountains of food) then when you said portion sizes i was like errrrrr!
Just because your family eat little, it's not right to presume hubby is the same.

What I still don't get is how so many posters are just loving sticking the boot into the OP for 'under catering' - but the OP's husband was the host as much as she was the hostess. At least the OP was trying to cater for the guests - he had made no effort and just ate as much as he could. So he is certainly a bad host and rude. And to my mind greedy, as I would cater for my guests before myself.

So much sexism and women blaming in these posts. An adult male seems able to shuck off all responsibility onto his wife and then poster after poster can round on her about her portions. Depressing.

I agree that the DH was rude. It will have been obvious that not enough food had been prepared, and he knows where the kitchen cupboards are so should have got more out rather than leaving so little for guests. He could have stuck a plate of cheese and crackers out with no effort at all.

But the OP has almost deliberately set him up to embarrass him. She eats with him every day. She knows what his normal portion is, and yet planned portions that were much smaller. Why wouldn't she factor his usual appetite in (and also assume that at least a couple of guests might want similar) when planning the meal? It does seem almost deliberate.

I'm weirdly obsessed by this thread and last night, I cooked chicken breasts! There were three meat eaters (adults, one very tall 19 year old lad) and 1 vegetarian adult. I had three chicken breasts, which I beat flat, covered in bread crumbs and fried. I then sliced them into 'fingers' and piled them on a plate. It looked like loads of chicken and indeed, there were leftovers after the three meat-eaters had helped themselves and gone back for seconds. These were chicken breasts from the butcher and bigger than the equivalent product from Sainsburys, but still. I served it with mash, a green salad, some hummus and a salad made with roast cauliflower (a whole, but small one), onions, pine nuts and parsley. Everyone ate their fill and no-one got up hungry. I offered pudding (just ice-cream) and no-one wanted any.

I don't think we undereat, but my catering was one (large) chicken breast per adult meat-eater, 2 salads, mash and another protein option (hummus) to give more to the vegetarian (bit last minute, but I didn't have any notice) and there were a few leftovers. Oh well.

My dad, however, seems to take leftovers as a personal affront, so had he been sitting down with us, I would have needed to make more!

The OP planned the meal. In my house, we do roughly 50 / 50 meal planning between me and DH, but I take responsibility for the meals I do.

If the OP wanted 1.5 breasts, but knows her DH is likely to want more like 2 or 3, that's 4 chicken breasts she needs straight off, even before guests. Yet she only cooked 9, allowing 5 breasts for the extra 4 people. Then berated him for being at fault when they ran out.

You don't live with and cook for someone without knowing what they eat. When my DH cooks, he knows what to allow for my portion.

Borsetshire Was that a normal family meal, that your sit down and eat in about half an hour?

If so, that does sound like plenty. I cook 1 chicken breast per meat eater too.

The amounts needed for a social event where eating is spread over 2 or more hours are more, because people will graze, go back for more etc. A social event is often a 'treat' meal, where people will treat themselves after a week of moderate eating.

Anyone wondering if DH thought that it was ok to eat everything left because he though everyone would already had piled their plates high (While he was hiding in the kitchen for some reason) as that’s what he does?

ie this food is likely not to be eaten and it’s just going to waste so I’ll just eat it all. They’ve all had what they wanted. I’ll have what I want.
Perhaps he doesn’t appreciate the etiquette of buffet style food?

I still don’t think I’d have done that though. I stand by what I said earlier he should have filled up prior on bread and butter or something if his stomach is stretched due to years if overeating and he wants to feel full at a meal. Rather than gorge on stuff that’s more for others. If I was the OP I’d have told him that prior. Either that or cook more food as I’d want guests to be able to fill up as much as they want.

And to my mind greedy, as I would cater for my guests before myself

But he did, he served himself last, the bloke only had one extra chicken breast and one and a half pittas, how that was supposed to be shared as seconds for six people I’ve no idea. But apparantly many people think That’s normal.

Either way, I’ve been overweight and I’d be considering divorce if my husband shamed me for what I ate in front of my family and then started a thread calling me greedy and saying how much I embarrassed him and hoovered up everything in sight, that I ate mountains of food, when I’d had an extra chicken breast and pitta.

There is such double standards on here, apparantly if a woman is over weight and had the temerity of eating an extra chicken breast it would be a Ltb situation if her husband dared to slag her off for it, but if it’s a man and the woman is the abusive one she should crack on and deal with the greedy bastard.

if a man came on here talking about his wife like this, in these terms, there would have been an outcry and the thread likely deleted.

I agree with this. He would be labelled all kinds of everything for food and fat shaming his wife.

Especially this

I made a joke about him eating all the crisps and DH went extremely red in the face.

It wasn't a joke and you know it. It was cruel.

You allowed half a packet of an individual portion of crisps per person...that's far from plenty.

Your embarrassment was as a result of under catering and the sad thing is you refuse to accept that.

The amount he ate was not one that should cause shock horror.

A pp said she consumed 1200 calories a day..well that's 800 calories less than the daily recommended amount for the average woman.

He reappears when everyone starts eating and serves his own plate. What he then does is finish EVERYTHING off

Then

There was a tiny piece of chicken left and a pitta bread

Both statements can't be true.

Then you later confirm what he did take and unless your plates were tiny, I can't see how his

was full and overflowing.

I was also still hungry

Why didn't you take your allocated 1.5 chicken breasts and 1.5 pitta bread and unlimited salad ?

How exactly did you over cater? With the extra half a chicken breast and half a pitta bread?

If you catered this amount, why dish up less than that for people?

Pitta bread is cheap and you skimped on it. Bucket loads of salad never gets eaten...who piles up on the salad...really.

@thenavigator

I feel the responses come across like that too. The female "under-feeder" vs the male host who hides away and only reappears to feed himself and eats everything in sight aside from the healthier stuff.

I probably did under-cater, but I catered with their eating habits in mind, but people are completely missing the point that the only person who over-ate here was the host himself.

I genuinely didn't think he would on this occasion as I was plating up the food. But he hid away and reappeared once we had all sat down and then hid again at the side of a tree to eat alone.

I tried my best after not entertaining or seeing my family for quite a while.

If I was hiding away not helping, eating more food than everyone else and hiding at the side of the garden, I'm sure as a female, I'd be getting even more stick than this.

If I was hiding away not helping, eating more food than everyone else and hiding at the side of the garden, I'm sure as a female, I'd be getting even more stick than this

Not really no, people would ask why you felt you needed to do that, and if possibly your husband liked to shame you for what you ate.

Op get a grip - I bet your one of the annoying skinny but clenched types who think you treat yourself when you eat a single crisp (yawn) - and start serving real food and real portions to your guests. Seriously I have a table over flowing when I have guests it’s part and parcel of having guests. I bet your husband isn’t over weight - just you self projecting. Poor sod. I would hide too.

I bet he didn’t over eat - it is YOU and only you with the problem op. You say you like entertain and yet you can’t even cater correctly. Stop blaming him and look at yourself.

Oh here comes @Bluntness100
Still ravaging threads I see.

OP , you have tried to shame your husband both with your family and on this thread for eating a plate of food made up of 2.5 chicken breasts, 3 pittas and crisps. I have catered many, many lunches like the one you describe and my husband has been overweight at times in out relationship.
It would never , in a million years, occur to me to come on to a thread and talk about him stuffing his face the way you have described your husband. Its unpleasant.

If you had come on and said "I undercatered, I didn't eat anything to make up for it but my husband didn't notice and took a big plateful... You might have got a more sympathetic response. It's Mumsnet, you would probably have got a few LTBs.

Ludicruss I'm not disputing that your DH may have issues with overeating etc. You know him best.

However, what he ate is not an unusual portion for a grown man. Particularly a larger man who will have higher calorie needs. Whatever his eating issues, you publicly shamed your DH for eating a fairly normal portion for his body. Can you see that?

If someone cooked enough to give you half as much as you need to eat, then shamed you for having your normal portion, you'd be upset, wouldn't you?

One or both of you should have got up and got more food out when it became obvious there wasn't enough. There must have been something in the house that could be offered to hungry guests. Cheese and crackers, bread rolls, ham... something. But that is a side issue - the main thing that shouldn't have happened is that he shouldn't have been shamed for what he ate.

OP I do generally over cater.
My DM used to work in food and quotes 500 gm meat per person, when planning on catering an event.
This to me is huge as I also use the palm of my hand as a portion size for protein and that would equate to 250 gm max for me.
I think you probably did under cater as protein and carbs are what people eat first, that said, you did have a lot of salad options.
In future, plate up his meat and carbs. Let him know that is his serve and for him to add his own salad.
I would also talk to him before the event, discuss the menu, and ask him how much he thinks he will eat. No judgment. Then you can work out how much more you need on top of that baseline.
My DH is tall and solid and would eat 2-3 chicken breasts at a special lunch.

@Ludicruss

Hey, bluntness100 is not ravaging threads, and she is a lot kinder than you are.